


Moving On

by KendylGirl



Series: The Alchemy of Butterflies [15]
Category: Call Me By Your Name (2017), Call Me By Your Name (2017) RPF
Genre: Dad Armie, Domestic Fluff, Family Dynamics, M/M, POV Harper, Parent-Child Relationship, True Love, happy endings all around
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-28
Updated: 2019-07-28
Packaged: 2020-07-21 06:00:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,646
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19997008
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KendylGirl/pseuds/KendylGirl
Summary: On the day of her medical school graduation, Harper Hammer reflects upon her life and those she holds dear.





	Moving On

**Author's Note:**

> Sometimes one can only appreciate a light in reflection, an image that makes the whole complete, for even in a darkened room, the gleam from a cat's eye can be seen. It is this idea which I've applied to this final installment to make the picture of a life made together come fully into focus.
> 
> Willowbrooke is so wonderful, she's even willing to beta whilst on vacation. She's a gem, plain and simple! :)
> 
> I've had this piece written for many months, but today is the birthday of a good friend who passed away ten years ago, so I figured it was an appropriate day for goodbyes ❤️

“Here,” she points with a jungle red fingernail.“Put your finger here and hold it.”My mother mutters to herself with the gold bobby pin between her teeth, “All the years and all the graduations in America, and no one could come up with a better design for these things…”She slides it in place and takes a step back to survey her work with narrowed eyes.

“I’m sure it’s fine, Mom,” I assure her, keeping my voice even. _Patience, Harper, she’s only trying to help_.I shrug.“We’re just going to rip them off and throw them in the air anyway, so…”

She leans over me and smoothes the braids of the tassel so they fall in an orderly column behind my right ear.“Can’t say that’s a bad idea.It’s not like this piece of cardboard is the height of fashion,” she comments drily, and I cannot keep my eyes from rolling.

Mom, of course, is decked out in a perfect cream-colored suit which I am sure cost enough to have covered my entire first semester of med school.It pinches at her waist and has a skirt so tight she could qualify for mermaid status.She’d rattled off the name of some designer a couple of weeks ago, but I didn’t recognize it; she was clearly proud to have gotten it bespoke the day after the collection had shown.I had just nodded politely from behind the shield of my textbook and went back to the comparatively blissful world of the pathogenesis of atherosclerosis.

“Is Larry here?”

“Yes, honey, we’re going to drive ahead and meet you there, if that’s okay with you?”

Larry is Mom’s third husband.After she and Dad divorced, she dated for a while, and when I was in fourth grade, she married a man named Stuart who ran his own airline.He had adored her and seemed to want to spend every waking moment with her.He moved the base of his company to Los Angeles so he could be home every night; when she went to the bakery in Texas or Colorado, he went with her, pulling her suitcases along while she’d bark, “Over _here_ , Stu, come on!What’s taking you so long?” He would stand at the edge of her crowd of flunkies primping her hair and touching up her already perfect make-up, beaming at her while she posed for promotional pictures at flashy locations that she thought would play best on whatever social media platform people her age were convinced The Fabulous People lurked.

After a few years, though, she tired of him.“He’s sooo… _clingy_ ,” she’d grimaced to me once as we’d sat next to their swimming pool, shaking out her long hair over the ruffles of her elaborate scarlet bathing suit and smoothing her eyebrows.“It makes me _embarrassed_ for him, and that’s no way to live, is it?”

Five years ago, she met Larry, a hedge fund manager with tufts of grey hair in his ears.He gives her freedom and unfettered access to his Black Card, and every few months, they meet up to take their jet to Bimini or Monaco or wherever Mom decides she’d like to show off her legs.Larry had found a buyer for her bakeries so she could devote the bulk of her year to claiming her seat in the front row of every show at every fashion week around the globe and shutting down stores in Paris and Milan exclusively for the shopping pleasure of her and her friends. 

She has never been happier.

“Of course!Is Ford riding with you?”

There’s a quiet knock at the door, the soft scrape of a throat clearing.“Um, Mom, the car’s out front.”

I grin and wave him in.Ford’s hair is bleached out from the sun, still looking like the downy fluff that had floated around his head when he was a baby.He’s wearing a powder blue suit that makes his eyes glow.“God, you look _so_ handsome!Get over here and give me a hug—for luck!” 

I drag him over as he blushes, and his thick arms fold around me.He’s always been a good hugger.“Good luck,” he mumbles into my shoulder.He is about nine inches taller than me, but he folds his body down as if he is crawling into my embrace and hiding there, just to accommodate me, as always.

My brother is the sweetest person I know.While I can’t seem to shut up, he is painfully shy, a precious and tender heart who’s never spoken a harsh word to anyone, a boy that I would defend with my fingernails and my fists and a brandished sword if necessary.He is in his final year at UCLA in mechanical engineering, and he got his first girlfriend last year, an equally shy girl named Natalie who is in the same program.I’ve often wondered what they talk about on their dates together.Or _if_ they talk.Maybe they don’t need to.

He pulls back and smiles down at me.“You’ll be good, Hops.You always are.”He blushes again, as if he’s ashamed to admit it to me, showing the soft underside once again.I get it.His heart only has soft sides, denied the lining of steel that mine has to protect it.He hasn’t got a single razor in his words, words that he measures out and uses only when necessary.He keeps everything inside until he cannot bear to anymore.

And I love him for it.

I wish I were the same way, but my fire has always risen to the surface.Mom calls it _sass_ ; Dad prefers _moxie_.

I know it’s neither.It is pure grit.

I kiss his cheek.“Thanks, Dorf.”I giggle as his blush deepens.I’ve called him that since I was five years old and kept getting the letters of his name mixed up when I would try to write it out in fat letters on drawings and birthday cards.He has never seemed to mind, even though he probably should.It sounds like an insult, but he’d never dream of correcting me or asking me to stop.He must find it endearing.Or he’s just that kind.

Mom starts to fuss with my hair, turning sections into deeper curls and placing them in specific positions around my shoulders.Out of habit, I shrug her off and sidestep her pursuit, whipping my head around to fix her with a glare, but she knows the routine and takes a step away, hands up, red lips fixed in a stern line.“Just want you to look your best, young lady.There’s nothing wrong with perfection, Harper.”

“I’d rather people listen to my speech and care what I have to say, not stare at my hair, Mother.”

Her spine stiffens.“No reason they can’t do both, is there?”

I feel my face heat, and I take a quick breath and point my finger, but before a single syllable can emerge, Ford grabs Mom’s hand and heads toward the door.“Better get down to the car, right, Mom?” he mumbles, eyes on his feet.

Mollified, she lets him lead her away, and he holds the door open for her in invitation.She shakes out her shoulders and tugs on the bottom hem of her perfect jacket to flatten it against her perfect middle.“We’ll see you later, darling,” she intones, forcing a modulation to it to conceal her frustration, as if that were possible to achieve.She stalks out, and Ford follows, giving me a wink before pulling the door closed behind him.

I stare at my reflection and sigh.In the left corner of my dresser is a framed picture of me and my brother when I was about four or five years old.We are dressed in horrid matching blue and white checkered outfits, looking like tricked-out escapees from _Children of the Corn_.My brother’s face is cinched up as if he’s seconds from bursting into tears, and my own head is tilted to the left in a posture that looks like I’m mugging for the camera but was really my desperate attempt to avoid the itchy lace around my neck.Every one of those outfits were hideous, and I could barely wait to wriggle out of them and put on my favorite pair of faded overalls and try to climb the sycamore tree in our side yard.

I smile when I remember that my mom had tried to throw those overalls out about a dozen times, and on each occasion, they would reappear in my drawer, folded neatly, with a little note from my dad stuffed into the pocket.

I love my mother deeply; she is witty and charming and knows how to get shit done at times that would paralyze most people.Nothing intimidates her, and I have an enormous amount of respect for that.Her stubbornness and single-minded focus are qualities I know I acquired from her, and they have played a significant role in my ability to push myself to excel.

But she and I long ago parted ways on what matters most in constructing an ideal life.When I went to college, she thought I didn’t date enough; when I got accepted to medical school, she worried that stress would prematurely age me.When I expressed my intention of pursuing emergency medicine or joining the military to work in a war zone, she thought I’d gone mad and immediately called my father, shrieking at him to make me see reason.

In the end, I settled on accepting a residency at a hospital in Philadelphia working with patients who truly need dedicated care and genuine compassion, unlike the pampered dilettantes I grew up with who look at doctors and nurses as wait staff paid to indulge their every request.My mother naturally was appalled at this decision, but I had resolved when I was a teenager that I had to do what felt right for me and no one else.I knew that I could never live a life of denial, putting my own dreams on hold to fulfill the expectations of others.

It is a lesson I learned from my father. 

Everyone does lip service to the ideas of choice and independence, but he is one of the few people I know who actually has followed his bliss, regardless of what his parents or his industry or his society told him he must do to be accepted.He had to have been terrified much of the time, plagued with doubts and fearing his failures, certain there were legions of critics lining up to throw his choices in his face, and I know there were precious few people around him who would have offered him any kind of encouragement.But he did it.He became an actor, a _superb_ actor, when his family threatened to disown him.He chose quality projects that would hone his skills when his agents tried to push him to big-budget parts based on the size of the paycheck.And when his marriage to my mother didn’t work out the way they’d planned, he allowed himself to love the person that I think he was meant to love all along.

The rap on the door is soft, but I jump.“Yeah?”

A dark head peeks inside.“Heeeyyy…what’s up, Doc?”

“Oh, hi!Come on in!”

Tim pads over on light feet and sits on the edge of my bed, pulling his suit jacket around him and fiddling with his cuff.He lifts his chin to me.“You nervous?”

I wave my hand.“Nah.Piece of cake.”

His lips purse.“Uh huh.”He watches my face slowly pull up on one side.“Yeah, I thought so.”

“I’m not sure why.It just feels…different, you know?”

He nods vigorously.“Yeah, yeah, I get it.After this, school’s finally done—you’re really moving on.Starting that real life in the real world.”He shivers and gives a sympathetic smile.“That’s enough to scare anyone, believe me.”

I get up and pirouette over to him, drop down on the bed next to him and put my head on his shoulder.

It was Tim who had shown me how to dance before my first school mixer.We had spent hours moonwalking and doing the electric slide in the backyard to cheesy top-40 tunes while Dad just watched, swaying in his hammock with his hands folded behind his head, chuckling and smiling so much I’m sure his face ached by the time night came.

And when Archie was eighteen and found to be full of cancer, we had all spent his last night with us gathered on the living room floor, pup stretched out between me and Ford, Dad keeping the fire going and hugs at the ready whenever the tears would flow fresh, while Tim made hot chocolate and sang lullabies in soft tones to keep our hearts afloat.He’s always been right where we’ve all needed him, exactly when we’ve needed him most.

Tim slides his arm around my waist and we just sit together for a few quiet moments.

“I got you something,” he murmurs.

My head pops up.“What?You did?”I cup my hands and wiggle my fingers.“What’re you waiting for?”I flash my teeth at him.“Gimme!” 

He smiles and pulls a thin box from his pocket.“I mean, it’s only a _little_ something, but I just…”I pry open the felt lid to find a slender silver bracelet comprised of small rings.I recognize the style—it’s a match to the one he wears regularly.At the center is a filled ring with a delicate script engraving: _Fille._ I turn it carefully in my fingers and realize that it is engraved on both sides.The opposite side reads _Amie._

Tim is watching my face closely, biting the corner of his lip. _He’s worried I won’t like it_.Over years and years of conversations, Tim had managed to teach me French.I had taken a couple of classes at school, and I hated them.Math and science are my jam, not languages, and I could never remember more than a few random vocabulary words.But he never made any of it seem like a lesson; he always told me how he’d get so mad at his own dad when he’d force Tim to ask and answer questions in French and would refuse to speak to him if he didn’t.So the two of us just gabbed, stray sentences or goofy remarks thrown at the television or traffic jams or the setting sun.We’d use it as a secret code in restaurants and elevators.Sometimes he would call Aunt Paulie and put her on the speakerphone, and we would all confer about desserts or rabbits or whatever I decided I wanted to ramble about at the time.

Last year I told him casually about my interest in Doctors Without Borders, that proficiency in French is a must for many of the countries that the organization services, and he volunteered to be my patient, groaning in breathless, broken French for hours about a multitude of symptoms and thrashing around in various degrees of exaggerated distress until I felt sure I could handle whatever I might eventually face.

I feel the tears climb up my throat, and I clutch the box tightly in my hands.“Thanks, Papa,” I whisper to him.

And his eyes are the ones that spill over, so I throw my arms around his waist and push my face against his chest.Other than a few wisps of grey around his temples, he hasn’t changed much since the first time I had called him that.I had been around seven, sitting in the kitchen of their house in New York where I spent most of my summers, pouting because some kids in the neighborhood had not invited me to play with them.Tim had made me a ridiculously large ice cream sundae, and we sat at the kitchen table on opposite sides gouging messily at the mound of it with long spoons. 

“This is so much better than tag anyway, Papa!” I had bubbled, licking my lips and wiping my face with a napkin.

At my words, his face had blanked out, and I thought I’d upset him until he smiled and nodded vaguely, and I’d caught him trying to surreptitiously wipe at his eyes with the back of his hand.Dad had come over and silently kissed us both on our foreheads, and when I looked up at him, he was crying, too.

I didn’t understand why.“Daddy?What’s wrong?Are you mad?”

He’d swallowed hard before he could answer.“No, pumpkin, I’m not mad.I just love you, both of you…very, _very_ much.”

Dad has always been good at that—loving all of us, no matter what.

“Everything all right in here?”

“Yeah, we’re fine.”I barely turn my head to reply, so some of Tim’s hair gets stuck in my mouth, and I giggle and sit back a little.He’s always kept it longer.He says Dad likes it that way.

Dad looms in the doorway, face soft, not wanting to interrupt us.Tim gives me a kiss on the cheek.“Knock ‘em dead, Hops,” he tells me and stands, buttoning his suit jacket.Tim goes over to the door and looks up at my dad, who reaches out his arms to rub Tim’s shoulders while studying his face.He murmurs something to him I can’t hear, and Tim shrugs minutely, so Dad pulls him into a tight hug, closes his eyes, and whispers a few words into his ear.

I am not sure if I ever want to get married.I’m not sure I believe in it as a productive social institution.But what I _do_ know is that it absolutely would not be worth the hassle unless I can find someone that I love and who loves me even half as much as these two men love each other.They never have to say a word about it, either.It’s just so consistently obvious in every one of their thoughts and actions, and neither of them is even aware of it.They’ve been married for more than twenty years, and they still act like attentive, besotted newlyweds.It’s unreal.Part of me wants to tease them about it, but most of me finds it all so precious that I could not bear to mock it, even in jest.

The summer after Papa turned 40, Dad took him on a vacation to Italy, so they could revisit the places they had loved when they had done their first film together, literally half his lifetime before.They’re both devoted romantics, and they’ve always made a practice of celebrating each other, of finding meaning in all manner of milestones.The longer they’re married, the more of these times they collect, to the point where every aspect of their lives together holds some special meaning to them.

Even as a child, I knew without a doubt:this is what love is supposed to look like.

When Tim is gone, my dad turns to me and does the same careful examination of my expression.I can’t help but smile.He looks so calm and upbeat right now, but I know that in about an hour, I’m going to look out over the crowd and see what I’ve seen at every other graduation ceremony I’ve had before:Dad hunched in his chair with his fist pressed to his mouth, tears glinting on his cheeks, while Papa rubs his back continuously in long, soothing lines.

“How ya’ doing, Scout?You about ready to go?”

“That’s _Doctor_ Scout to you, sir,” I deadpan, and he drops his head back and laughs deeply.He has a _great_ laugh.

I hook the clasp on my new bracelet and stuff the pages of my speech into my small clutch.“Yeah, I guess I have everything I need.”

He rests his hands lightly on my cheeks and gazes at me.“That makes two of us, baby,” he says soberly, as if he’s just grasping the depth of truth in those words for himself.

“Thank you, Dad,” I stare him down.

He blinks.“For what, honey?”

“For _everything_ ,” I tell him.It’s not enough.But I don’t know how else to tell him, and he deserves to know.

“I’m so proud of you, Harper Grace, you have no idea!”His voice, thick with emotion, falters across my name, and it makes my own tears surge to match his.

I take a deep, crackling breath.“I’m proud of you, too, Daddy…because I do, I _do_ know!”

He wraps me up in his arms, the strong arms that have been my guide and my protection since the day I was born.The arms that once could toss me in the air and catch me effortlessly are the same arms that have allowed me to fly all on my own.I used to think that everything in my life was manageable when I was held in these arms, and today, I realize their real power is in how far they have allowed me to reach out, to have the ability to hold myself up on a solid faith in my own strength. 

That is my father’s legacy to me, to all of us.Everything I have learned about true and selfless love, how it comes back to you to fill your life with more joy, I have learned from watching him and the lives he has touched.That subtle alchemy wrought with fortitude and care has been the miracle that carries each of us forward and lets us be a part of the change that starts and ends with a butterfly’s wings.

**Author's Note:**

> This series has truly been a labor of love, brought to life by these gentlemen and their uncanny ability to do things which are memorable and irresistible. Before this series, attempting an RPF was not something I felt capable of doing; after this series, I hope that I've managed to honor these men despite taking their names and using slivers of their lives to create my own reality. To any of you who have been kind enough to read these pieces, I truly thank you!
> 
> I've noticed of late that Armie repeatedly refers to himself as a bad parent, to the point that I suspect that is the feedback he is getting consistently from certain adults in his life...What I hope he realizes is that everyone doubts himself as a parent, but what kids will remember is how you make them feel about themselves. Working a lot or having an occasional drink cannot erase the pure, unconditional love that gives your children a safe place to land and the security to launch their own lives into the stratosphere. 
> 
> I am going to reserve the right to possibly sneak in a bonus addition here or there as the real life of these boys is often deliciously tempting. I'll pray you'll be willing to read those or any other works that I've written or have yet to write--please stay tuned! :)


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